This invention relates to a disc cartridge, and more particularly to a disc cartridge which has a hard disc, particularly, a double-sided type hard disc housed in a casing.
In general, a disc-type data recording carrier such as a compact disc (CD), a video disc (LD) or the like is used in a manner to be removed from a packing case and set in a recording and/or reproducing equipment such as a disc player.
Conventionally, such a disc type recording carrier has been desired to be protected from an environment because it is not only readily covered with dust and damaged but adversely affected due to a variation in temperature. For this purpose, the use of an envelope such as a tray, a casing or the like has been proposed to protect a disc. Unfortunately, such a conventional envelope is not effective to protect a double-sided hard disc, because the housing of the disc in a storage space defined in the envelope causes the disc to be contacted with the envelope. Also, the conventional disc cartridge has another disadvantage that when it is set in a disc player, centering of the disc fails. More particularly, the disc fails to be correctly positioned in the disc player or deviates from a correct position with respect to a disc driving element of the player such as a disc head, so that rapid operation of the disc cartridge may not be carried out. Further, the envelope causes the disc to contact an inner surface thereof during storage or transportation of the disc cartridge, resulting in not only the disc being damaged and polluted as well as exposed to a variation in temperature, but causing handling of the disc cartridge to be troublesome.
Accordingly, it would be highly desirable to provide a disc cartridge which is capable of readily carrying out centering of a disc with respect to a disc player and safely housing the disc in a casing without contacting a recording surface section of the disc directly with the casing.